{"id":719788,"date":"2026-07-30T21:25:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-30T21:25:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/719788\/"},"modified":"2026-07-30T21:25:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-30T21:25:09","slug":"with-spacex-circling-verizon-figures-out-succession","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/719788\/","title":{"rendered":"With SpaceX circling, Verizon figures out succession"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Verizon CEO Dan Schulman is getting his house in order, as the telecom industry braces for the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.semafor.com\/article\/07\/29\/2026\/spacex-looks-to-compete-with-the-carriers\" class=\"_linkEmbed_1pt7l_31\" rel=\"no-referrer nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">ultimate disruptor<\/a>, Elon Musk, and as the company\u2019s executives fret about the possibility of a sale.<\/p>\n<p>Schulman will tap a longtime lieutenant with deal chops, Alfonso Villanueva, to run the telecom giant\u2019s $107 billion consumer business, according to people familiar with the matter. He previously ran that wireless division on an interim basis, following the departure earlier this year of longtime executive Sowmyanarayan Sampath, who was seen as CEO-in-waiting.<\/p>\n<p>Villanueva will remain Verizon\u2019s chief transformation officer. He previously oversaw M&amp;A for PayPal under Schulman.<\/p>\n<p>Villanueva\u2019s appointment brings certainty to a unit that represents 78% of Verizon\u2019s revenue but has been without a permanent leader for months. His new position is set to be officially announced Thursday. Verizon didn\u2019t run an outside search process to replace Sampath, some of the people said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s not a surprise that some employees may be concerned about the direction of the company,\u201d a Verizon spokesperson said. \u201cWe\u2019ve gone with a couple of rounds of cost-cutting which have included job cuts.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Among those concerns: Speculation has swirled among current and former senior Verizon executives that Schulman is readying Verizon\u2019s flagship wireless business for sale to Musk\u2019s SpaceX or another buyer, according to other people familiar with the matter.<\/p>\n<p>Musk looms large over Verizon and its competitors, AT&amp;T and T-Mobile. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.semafor.com\/article\/07\/29\/2026\/spacex-looks-to-compete-with-the-carriers\" class=\"_linkEmbed_1pt7l_31\" rel=\"no-referrer nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Semafor reported Wednesday<\/a> that Musk is exploring ways to grow his spectrum portfolio with an eye on a terrestrial expansion, either via M&amp;A or by competing at next year\u2019s spectrum auction.<\/p>\n<p>Asked directly about whether he would seek to purchase a carrier \u2014 specifically, Verizon \u2014 Musk in September 2025 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=qeZqZBRA-6Q\" class=\"_linkEmbed_1pt7l_31\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" target=\"_blank\">said on the All-In podcast<\/a>: \u201cIt\u2019s not out of the question. I suppose that may happen.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAny assertion that Verizon is being positioned for a sale to SpaceX \u2014 or any other entity \u2014 is unequivocally false, unsubstantiated, and entirely without merit,\u201d the Verizon spokesperson said.<\/p>\n<p>SpaceX didn\u2019t respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Verizon CEO Dan Schulman is getting his house in order, as the telecom industry braces for the ultimate&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":719789,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[90,416,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-719788","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-science","tag-space","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/719788","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=719788"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/719788\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/719789"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=719788"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=719788"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=719788"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}